"Gingerpipp's Izola Page" Izola by gingerpipp

Hi there, thanks for joining me... just incase you had no idea im writing a little journal of my travels from Venice to Slovenia to Prague... Slovenia starts with this place, Izola, a cracking little harbour town, but enough of my banter, lets get on with it...

Well.. where to start, how about a beginning.... My brother an I entered Slovenia via the 'Prince of Venice' Catemeran (50 Euros per person...check out Prague page for a bit more info)(my spelling has a lot to be desired btw), now im usually pretty ok on boats, i mean, i've hoped along to France on a ferry enough times... but oohhhh nooo, the trip took about two and a half hours, and i think i spent a total of 30 minutes in the open air... I think i made the toilet my own personal friend... i almost put up a sign on the door saying 'home sweet home'. We docked, not soon enough, in Izola, a small ish town on the coast... obviously. Now, in Izola there are about 3 hotels, two are normally priced and one is a little cheaper (Hotel Riviera .. about 3500 SIT a night), unfortunaly for us there happened to be an International Hand Ball competition for 14/15 year olds, so all the little scally wags had booked up the cheap hotel, so he had to fork out a little bit more (I cant recal the hotel i stayed at but its the very first one you reach after leaving the Catamaran)... however, the receptionist was very very friendly and helpful. We had to catch the train to Ljubljana (train from Koper to Ljubljana costs 2740 Tolar for 2 people) the next day which required catching an early bus to Koper, and the lady, bless her, whilst we were fast asleep not only found out the precise times of bus and train but also rang our room in the morning to wake us up so we had enough time to get ready, have breakfast and find the bus stop.... which is another story. But that was our first impression of Slovenia, the poeple were very friendly. Venice contained only 4 nice people... but in Izola the first 4 poeple we met were nice.

Now ... after being in Izola only 1 day i came to a very curious and unsettling conclusion.... French is the most pointless language to learn unless you are either French, love France or are Canadien. NOBODY ELSE ANYWHERE SPEAKS THE DARN LANGUAGE. And so, being British i had quite a few years of french language education under my belt but it turned out that it was completely and utterly scooby doo useless. German however... now thats a language worth learning ... and guess what, heres my story to explain why...

On leaving our hotel we were off to find the bus stop, armed with the name of the place and 30 minutes to spare we thought it couldnt be that hard cuase the people here were nice... werent they? hum... after 10 minutes of male "i shalnt ask for directions' we decided to ask for help, the first man directed us through the ship yard... we'd been through here before but it was away from the main town, but we ventured off... after a few minutes we thought we'd make sure and asked two young girls (who just 'happen' to be quite attractive) they too sent us up through the naval yard.. so off we trotted, but after abou 5 minutes we couldnt find the damn place and we were a way from the town center so we thought we'd try again and ask 3 elderly ladies... they didnt speak a work of english and so my brothers very basic German skills came to the rescue. They undoubtedly directed us back down the hill into the center, we must have looked knackered and slightly annoyed/mift cause one of the ladies, bless her cotton socks, split from her group and led us directly to the place we needed to wait for the bus. Now that lady did something kind that day, she went out her way to help two lost strangers... now when i think of it, and as i am now, i always smile and think .. the world hasnt gone to hell quite yet. :o)

Well... thats it from Izola ... the next epilogue starts on the Ljubljana page, so if your really that bored and have nothing else to do then why not read the rest of my story...

Until then ... thanks for tuning in.